What can we (still) learn from SNO and solar neutrinos?(Dr. Ryan Martin, Queens University, Canada)

by Dr Ryan Martin (Queens University, Canada)

Thursday May 7, 2009, 3:30 PM → 5:00 PM Pacific/Honolulu

Rm 112 (UHM - Watanabe Hall)

This talk will summarize the vast amount of knowledge that has been obtained from solar neutrinos as well as try to convince the audience that there is still a lot to be learned. I will begin by introducing the solar neutrino problem; a discrepancy in the number of neutrinos coming from the Sun compared with the standard solar model (SSM) prediction. This discrepancy, first observed by Ray Davis in the late 1960s and confirmed later by other experiments, persisted for over 30 years until the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory (SNO) experiment showed that solar neutrinos change flavour on their way to Earth. In addition to solving the solar neutrino problem, SNO and other experiment such as KamLAND and Super-K have ushered us into an era of precision neutrino experiments. I will show what solar neutrinos can still teach us about the Standard Model and the Sun to motivate the future results that will still come from SNO and other experiments in the near future such as Borexino and SNO+. I will finish by giving some details of one particular analysis of the SNO data that fits into the framework of precision measurements of neutrino properties.